Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!mandrill!neoucom!wtm From: wtm@neoucom.UUCP Newsgroups: sci.electronics,comp.sys.amiga Subject: Re: noKLICKstart Message-ID: <695@neoucom.UUCP> Date: Fri, 18-Sep-87 08:42:39 EDT Article-I.D.: neoucom.695 Posted: Fri Sep 18 08:42:39 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 26-Sep-87 16:47:41 EDT References: <3688@zen.berkeley.edu> Organization: Northeastern Ohio Universities College of Medicine Lines: 26 Keywords: Matsuhita, Mitsumi, Sony, NEC, Chinon, Panasonic, Fujutsu Xref: utgpu sci.electronics:1264 comp.sys.amiga:8172 Summary: Zillions of disk drive OEM versions In my engineering tunure, I've discovered disk drive interfaces are nearly as frustrating as RS-232 (and other) serial ports :-). A wihile back I was trying to tame a cantankerous Teac 55-B drive in an AT&T 6300. I called Teac to get the low-down on the drive. When I got through to their engineer he asked "What have you got", to which I said "55-B". He said, "like I said, what have you got". It turns out that there were something like 95 OEM versions of the 55-B. Their engineer further expalained that on average, the layout of the PCB for the "generic" models of the 55-B changes about every two weeks (!). The upshot of this is that drives you get on the surplus market can be almost anything at all. In the case of Teac, they disavow all knowledge of any of the OEM versions. Thus, buyer beware when adding surplus drives to your system. Pins 1, 2, and 34 as Bryce noted can be almost anything. At least defacto standardization has taken over for most of the rest of the interface. For the moment, I'll stick with my engineering solution of leaving something in the drive. Bill wtm@neoucom.UUCP <>